Chapter 10 - The Night Red Creek Chose a Side
Ethan did not call an army.
He called a town.
Not to fight.
To watch.
At seven that evening, tractors appeared on county roads leading toward Copperhead Ridge. Ranchers parked at pullouts with thermoses and binoculars. Teenagers with hunting cameras mounted them along game trails. Volunteer firefighters monitored radio traffic. The local tow company reported every heavy truck moving after dark. June Miller had spent forty years feeding half the county, and Red Creek had finally decided that minding its own business had gone far enough.
Vega hated the liability.
Daniel loved the coverage.
"No one approaches the mine," Ethan told everyone at the diner. "No heroics. Record plates. Report movement. If you see weapons, back away."
An old rancher named Walt Jensen raised his coffee cup. "That's disappointing. I brought my good rifle."
"Leave it in the truck."
"You're no fun."
The room laughed.
It was the first real laughter Ethan had heard since Cole dumped the milkshake over his head.
Rachel sat at a back table with Luke's hospital laptop, reconstructing financial transfers. Her red dress was gone. She wore jeans and one of Ethan's old sweatshirts.
They still had not resolved what existed between them.
But they were working on the same side.
At 9:14 p.m., a rancher reported two tanker trucks leaving Copperhead Ridge.
At 9:19, a volunteer firefighter spotted a black SUV heading south.
At 9:22, the tow operator identified the SUV's plate as belonging to Judge Bell.
Bell was still in custody.
Vega dispatched troopers.
The SUV fled, hit a ditch, and rolled.
Inside, agents found no driver.
Only a remote-control steering rig and a cooler containing blood bags.
A decoy.
Daniel studied the timing.
"They want us looking south."
Rachel turned the laptop around.
"Then look north."
She had found a transfer made forty minutes earlier from a Northstar shell account to a private rail operator.
The destination was a freight spur beneath Copperhead Ridge.
"They're moving people by train," she said.
Ethan looked at the map.
An abandoned mining spur connected to a commercial rail line twelve miles north.
"How fast can they get out?" Vega asked.
Daniel calculated. "If they already loaded, twenty minutes."
Ethan called Walt Jensen.
"Walt, where are you?"
"North crossing."
"Anything on the tracks?"
A pause.
"Lights underground. Coming our way."
"Back off."
"Already did."
Thirty seconds later Walt shouted, "Train's out. Six cars. No markings."
Vega moved state units north.
Ethan and Daniel drove separately toward the crossing.
Rachel insisted on coming.
Ethan said no.
She stared at him.
"This entire network used my credentials. Luke was taken because of me. June is missing. Your father may be alive. Don't lock me in a room and call it protection."
"This isn't punishment."
"Then don't make it feel like one."
He looked at her for a long moment.
"Stay with Vega."
"Fine."
It was not agreement.
It was a negotiated line.
At the rail crossing, the train did not slow.
State units had placed portable barriers on the access road, not the tracks. Stopping a freight train was not simple.
Daniel lifted night-vision binoculars.
"Last car has armed men."
Ethan saw them too.
"They expect interception."
Vega's radio crackled.
"Command, we have an issue. Rail operator says the train has no scheduled track clearance. It's headed toward an occupied commercial line."
If it continued, it could collide with a grain train carrying two crew members and thousands of tons of cargo.
Helix had built another choice.
Chase the prisoners or prevent a public disaster.
Ethan studied the map.
Then he smiled faintly.
"They think there are only two choices."
May you like
He pointed to an old cattle loading spur three miles ahead.
"There are three."
